Topeng Dancers in Java - Year 1873 Cardboard Frame

Description:

Tari Topeng or Mask Dance is one of the many native dances of the Indies. The image depicts Batavian Topeng dancers interpreting folktales or local epics. 

Reproduction after a lithograph published in the year 1873 in the Netherlands, based on a drawing by Ernest Hardouin. Hardouin arrived in Batavia in the year 1842 as a decor designer with a French theatrical troupe. He made numerous sketches and drawings of the city and its inhabitants, which later back in the Netherlands were made into decorative lithographs.